Our first face-to-face meeting with Samsung’s Galaxy S 4

A photo tour of our hands-on time with the device.

Samsung took to the stage of New York City's Radio City Music Hall this evening to unveil its newest flagship phone, the Galaxy S 4. While the focus of this evening's presentation was overwhelmingly the phone's new software features, Samsung also had plenty of phones on the floor for us to get our hands on. Ars Associate Writer Casey Johnston will be publishing a more thorough article with her hands-on impressions shortly, but in the meantime, we'll walk you through the new phone's basics in the form of a handy photo gallery. Enjoy!

Andrew Cunningham

The Galaxy S 4 is in many ways comparable to the outgoing Galaxy S III. They both share the same light, all-plastic construction and general button layout. The S 4 adds a larger, 1080p display, however, as well as new software features and faster internals.

Andrew Cunningham

The Galaxy S 4 is in many ways comparable to the outgoing Galaxy S III. They both share the same light, all-plastic construction and general button layout. The S 4 adds a larger, 1080p display, however, as well as new software features and faster internals.

Andrew Cunningham

The S 4's sides are also plastic, albeit with a metallic finish.

Andrew Cunningham

The headphone jack and a microphone pinhole are on the top edge of the phone, while a micro USB port for charging is on the bottom.

Andrew Cunningham

The removable back of the phone is plastic with a faux-brushed metal texture.

Andrew Cunningham

The S 4 retains Samsung's now-standard button layout: capacitive menu and back buttons to the left and right of a physical home button.

Andrew Cunningham

The S 4 (left) compared to the Galaxy S III (right). The S 4 feels about the same in the hand—they're pretty close to equal in width and thickness, and the extra screen size doesn't seem to have made the phone any larger than its predecessor.

The S 4 (bottom) is also of comparable thickness to its predecessor (top).

Andrew Cunningham

The S 4's touchscreen can work with any old gloves, doing away with the need for special capacitive hand coverings.

Andrew Cunningham

Next, we decided to take a look at the software. New features aside, the new phone will look very familiar to anyone who has ever used Samsung's TouchWiz interface.

Andrew Cunningham

Samsung's S Voice appears to have been improved somewhat—it actually understood our demands even in the loud, crowded hands-on area.

Andrew Cunningham

If you don't want any part of the S 4's new navigation features, most of them can be disabled in the settings.

Andrew Cunningham

The Galaxy S 4's front and rear cameras can be engaged simultaneously.

Andrew Cunningham

The Galaxy S 4 is the only non-Nexus phone we've seen to date running Android 4.2.2, which as of this writing is the absolute brand-newest version of Android.

Andrew Cunningham / Andrew has a B.A. in Classics from Kenyon College and has over five years of experience in IT. His work has appeared on Charge Shot!!! and AnandTech, and he records a weekly book podcast called Overdue.